Formation of the Escherichia coli division septum is catalyzed by a number of essential proteins (named Fts) that assemble into a ring-like structure at the future division site. Several of these Fts proteins are intrinsic transmembrane proteins whose functions are largely unknown. Although these proteins appear to be recruited to the division site in a hierarchical order, the molecular interactions underlying the assembly of the cell division machinery remain mostly unspecified. In the present study, we used a bacterial two-hybrid system based on interaction-mediated reconstitution of a cyclic AMP (cAMP) signaling cascade to unravel the molecular basis of septum assembly by analyzing the protein interaction network among E. coli cell division proteins. Our results indicate that the Fts proteins are connected to one another through multiple interactions. A deletion mapping analysis carried out with two of these proteins, FtsQ and FtsI, revealed that different regions of the polypeptides are involved in their associations with their partners. Furthermore, we showed that the association between two Fts hybrid proteins could be modulated by the coexpression of a third Fts partner. Altogether, these data suggest that the cell division machinery assembly is driven by the cooperative association among the different Fts proteins to form a dynamic multiprotein structure at the septum site. In addition, our study shows that the cAMP-based two-hybrid system is particularly appropriate for analyzing molecular interactions between membrane proteins.In Escherichia coli, the cell division process, also referred to as cytokinesis, constriction, or septation, is one of the most central yet poorly understood aspects of the bacterial physiology (for reviews, see references 5, 33, and 45). The event takes place at the midcell and starts after the bacterial chromosomal DNA has been duplicated and segregated into two daughter nucleoids. Cell division genes, named fts, have been identified mainly through conditional mutants that form long filamentous cells at nonpermissive temperatures (4, 5). At present, at least fourteen proteins are known to be specifically required for the E. coli cell septation (for reviews, see references 1, 5, 33, 42, and 45). The majority of the Fts proteins are anchored to the cell membrane, and most of them appear to localize to the bacterial septum in a sequential order (for reviews, see references 5, 33, 35, and 40). Fluorescence microscopy studies using immunofluorescence or the green fluorescent protein (GFP) fused to the Fts proteins have revealed that assembly of the septum starts with the positioning of an FtsZ ring in the cell center. The FtsZ ring is stabilized by FtsA and ZipA, which localize to the septum independently of each other but only in the presence of the FtsZ protein. FtsQ follows FtsK, whose localization requires both FtsA and ZipA proteins, in this hierarchical assembly. Then FtsL, FtsB, FtsW, FtsI, FtsN, and AmiC are successively recruited to the FtsZ ring (for reviews, see refere...